Math Strategies

I am currently completing my student teaching this Spring semester. As a middle level major, I have two concentrations, ELA and Math. Currently I am student teaching in a math classroom and I absolutely love sixth grade and my cooperating teacher. However, I had a professor at my university who has turned me off to teaching math, which really stinks because that is my first placement. My professor's attitude and unrealistic expectations of how you should run your math class has me really worried about teaching math.

In my math methods class, my professor didn't teach us any strategies for teaching math other than how to use manipulatives like base 10 blocks. That obviously won't work for every lesson. So I guess my question is....what are some good instructional strategies for teaching math, not just in a middle school setting, but in general? Also, what can I do to help myself feel more comfortable about teaching math? What are some things I can do to rekindle the love I had for math as well as help my students develop a like for math as well? My cooperating teacher is wonderful and has helped me out a lot. I have gotten a tremendous amount of awesome ideas from her, but I want other people to weigh in so...EDUCATE ME!!!

This is a struggle for me as well, as I want to do appeal to a variety of learning styles. At the same time, in my district, we are bound to the book for math, unfortunately! We have to follow it to the letter, which has limited what I can do to incorporate a variety of different learning and performance styles.

Have you tried NCTM illuminations? They have a variety of lessons, activities, handouts, etc. I found the lesson plans to be fairly detailed and easy to carry out instruction wise, as long as you have the time. I really enjoy this site. It is very easy to navigate. You can select your grade range and topic if you want. The lessons are hands on for the most part.

Have you explored Marilyn Burns book "About Teaching Mathematics?" It might not be very helpful middle school math, but if you are in an elementary setting ever (even upper elementary), you might find some resources there.